Learning to Walk a Steady Life

During the past several days, I had been struggling big time with my daily walk with God, and that I could tell because of how many spiritual battles consecutiverly I had been loosing. It seems like whenever you are in the higuest point of your relationship with God, then like a rollercoaster you start descending fast till you realize how bad you are. Spiritual rollercoasters has been the story of my life, story the now more than ever, I feel God has determined to change to a different story in my life. After a lot of thinking, I have come to understand that one of God’s divine specific purpose for my life in me being on the ships is that He wants me to grow mature in certain areas where I am weak and tend to be my rollercoasters and the best way was to take me out of my comfort zone, namely, my country and my family and put me in a place where it is only me and God, no one else. How long more? Only God knows, but one thing I know, it will depend on how much I trust and let God guide me and how much obedient to Him I am. I realized that being home, it was easy to not live up to the Spirit standards, a life full of fruits and a life of holiness. I guess, I would feel crappy for I was letting God down, but in my persistant rebellion it could pass days, weeks and even months in that state of sinful life, apart from God, without taking action and repenting. And then again, after some time and help from my parents and friends I would decide it was enough of that kind of life and I would repent and receive God’s forgiveness and then again after some time would come down. Well, on the ships, being down for any amount of days, is something really really dangerous. I have learned that, the hard way. Sin is breathable in every corner of a cruise ship. It can swallow you in a matter of seconds. Only then I realized, that I can’t let my guard down for a second. And whenever I had, the worst days of my life had come to pass. Days like those, I feel extremely crappy, down, wondering the reason of my existance, and even doubting about my true identity in Christ. The devil had won and he knows it, he had me in his grip and he won’t let me go until and only when I lift up my eyes to Jesus to help me out. I guess this would be the second important purpose of my life at this stage of it. And when this one is growing, then the other purpose of my life which is to reach as many people as possible to God, becomes easy.

The Dog and House of Mirrors

I remember, once I read a nice story that talked about a dog who entered into one of these Fairs thousand mirrors house and upon entering he saw thousands of dogs staring back at him. Right away he felt overwhelmed and put a hard expression in his face and inmediately the other thousand dogs had the same expression in their faces. The dog, got frightened and started barking in anger and inmediately the other thousand dogs barked back at him in anger. So finally the dog went away thinking to himself, what a horrible place to be. Some time later, another dog entered the same place and upon entering, he saw with awe lots of dogs staring to him and he smiled and started to move his little tail and inmediately the other thousand dogs answered back at him with the same expression of happiness. He left that place thinking to himself, what a wonderful place to be. Point to wonder about....It's all about what you express. If you express anger and show yourself grumpy and picky, that's what you will get from others. If you greet others and smile at them, that's exactly what you will receive from them. That's a lesson I have been learning since I joined the ships . On the ships there are so many cultures and backgrounds and when you first come into a cruise ship with another 1000 crew you feel overwhelmed and not only you but everyone else. Different languages, believes, religion, colors and thoughts. So the first thing you do if you are not extremely outgoing is to put on your hardest face, and try to show that you don't need of others. The outcome of that? well, nobody greets or smile at you and you feel miserable. And when there is more than one with that kind of behaviour, then you have a very unfriendly working environment. So I have been improving a lot ever since I realized it was all in me. I tend to greet every single person that crosses in my way, and try to get into a small conversation of whatever is going on. I have been trying to make every one of those encounters like to most important thing in the world. Even those ones who have a tough face and don't greet no one, even those one, after a couple of attemps from my side, when they see me, they change their expression and put a smile in their face when they see me. I am amazed to see how true it is and it totally works. It not only opens up relationships, but it also opens up opportunities to talk to them about God, his Son and his gift. That's exactly what is happening in my life and for that I thank God, because it's been all him. For me, it has not been easy. I am not an outgoing person, most of the time, I feel like the first dog who in fear shows himself picky. But God upon my request has been changing that little by little over the years, and today I can say I have improved a lot in this particular area.

Take the Decision to Make it Happen

On our last christian fellowship, the leader was talking about spending quality time with Jesus in prayer and meditation and how difficult it had been for him in the last few days because of the Soccer World Cup. Upon getting into his cabin, he would turn on the TV and watch the matches. He admitted that it had been tough for him to get focus on Christ for his attention was on a wordly thing. He didn’t mean to say that to watch a soccer game per se was sinful, he was rather saying that the time he was supposed to invest in nurturing his heart and mind with God, he was using it for something else, and that was sinful. As the discussion went over, one of the guys said “ I am sorry, but don’t ask me not to watch the last three matches of the W.Cup, cuz for nothing in the world I would miss them” Lol, that was honest, that came from his heart, but as the leader later on said “If God wants you to spend time in prayer just during the time the games are being played, you should do”, to what the guy answered he won’t do and then repent later on. Now, let me get this straight, I don’t believe that he would go to hell for this act of clear and open disobedience toward God in this hipotetically example, but as the leader put it out very clear, he would miss blessings from God that were meant to be given to him, blessing that were supposed to be passed onto others through him and perhaps it would also open doors to the enemy that he would use against him to harm him and put him down. The leader put the example of Benny Hinn; he had an upcoming campaign and before those huge concentrations he would spend at least 3 days confined into a room spending time with God alone in prayer and meditation of the Scriptures without any kind of interruption. It happened that his sister who lives in a very far away country came over to visit him and even though he was supposed to spend time with God before the campaign, he decided to spend some time with his beloved sister. Now, don’t get me wrong here, there is absolutely nothing wrong in someone spending time with his sister, but if you have something else that requires your fully undivided attention specially if it has to do with God, then nothing else is more important than that. God deserves our fully undivided attention. So the campaign began and not even one sign and miracle occurred. Could you imagine that? People are used to see signs, wonders and healing miracles on Hinn campaigns, but not this time around. Then, he realized the reason of it. Once again, the fellowship leader put another example, this time, Dr. Yongisho from South Korea. He was praying in his room, and as he says, there is nothing else more important than talking to Dad, so it is a rule for him and his family knows about it, no interruption while talking to the Creator. Suddenly, the president of South Korea rang him up, his wife answered the phone and requested to talk to Yongisho and she said, he is praying in his room, to what the president answered “It is the president of the country who is talking, you don’t know? When Yongisho got that message from his wife, he told her to answer “I am talking to God, you don’t know”. It is a very powerful story and testimony. That we should aim to. We spend way to much time in things that are worthless when viewed against the whole picture of Christ, his sacrifice, our life purpose and eternal future. Like John Piper says, christians are thrilled fishing, collecting shells, sailing in boats and golfing their way to heaven when we should be connected with what is really worthy, when we should be going out there to speak out loud about Jesus and his love for all. We can’t be able to open our hearts and share with others what we don’t have and feel. We can’t have and feel God’s love and passion if we don’t spend quality time with Him. At the end of the day, he is the reason of our whole existance and everything we are and have.

Thanks, God for your holy revelation that touches and teaches my heart.

The Power of a Good Book

I’ve been reading this book called “It’s your ship” written by a former U.S. Naval Captain who took command of USS Benfold few years ago. The whole plot of the book is about how he used his learned over the years leadership skills to turn USS Benfold in the “best damn ship of the Navy”, as he stated. The book is having a huge impact in my own experience as a leader and it is challenging my own conventional mostly obsolete way of leading. It has been stirring my thoughts and I since I am aware of some things now, I start to realize where I am lacking. I am good at making things happen and getting things done, if someone don’t do something he was supposed to do, I do it myself and end of story. I get the credit from my boss, who only cares about results irregardless of the methods used to achieve it. But the truth is, although I delegate things, I haven’t learned to motivate my junior managers to be passionate about the job, to take the best possible decisions by themselves, and to motivate their subordinates. So that in the end people do things because they understand the importance of it, they get to be more responsible, they get to grow as individuals with potential to achieve more and more and I get to have an easier life, satisfied that I have achieved something real and durable. So now I am into learning this new stuff, that even though is not a built-in skill in me, I can learn and use. Although learning is a painful process that incommodate is worth of going through it. Story of my life. I can tell with all authority about it. Easiest thing in the world is not to try, or learn and continuing with the same stubborn way of doing things that don’t benefit no one. I’ve been applying some principles already and it is paying off. One of the reasons why I decided that I wanted to take the challenge of being a manager in this 50.000 + employees organization is that during my relatively short period of time in the company, I’ve seen to many things that are wrong irregardless of what the company policies and procedures pursues. So I thought I could make the difference at least within my range of power. And, although that is my goal, I’ve been learning the hard way and now through this book, that I won’t be able to change the whole thing overnight. It will take time, wisdom and lots of patience. But as of my small subdepartment that I run, I already started doing changes that will benefit all. I might encounter friction in the way because of other mid level managers’ old and obsolete schooling, but I am up for the challenge. We can’t fight today’s war and be fully effective with what was effective years ago. The world changes and so the rules and goals. Yesterday, in the hotel bussiness, all that mattered was to get the guest satisfied no matter if the employee worked 18 hour straight, with very short breaks among others unconformities. Today, the guest is way more exigent and demandant and it is required from the hotel staff to be mentally fresh in order to greet the guest sincerely and transmit a sense of contagious peace and satisfaction that at the end of the day will keep bringing that guest back. My goal is to make my team take good decisions by themselves within the range I consider safe and at the same time have them bring new and fresh ideas that would rock this bussiness.

Finished the Training Program

So here am I, sitting at LAX airport, once again on a vessel transfer. I am getting tired of these travelings from one ship to another. Extreme long waiting on the airports, long flights and of course don’t forget about the hazzling of packing and unpacking over and over again in a short period of time. Anyway, apart from that, I am satisfied with myself and thankful to God, for I finished the managament training program in M/S Paradise. So finally got my stripes and am ready to run the business by myself. It was a two month program, kind of short for what it really takes, but it didn’t take me more than that to finish it. Gavin (Head Depart. Manager) was very pleased and so was Catalin (evaluator) with my performance over the evaluation period and so am I. They pointed out some aspects that I need to develop though, in order to be a better and more effective manager, so I am ready to take the challenge and improve myself in those areas.

Now, looking in retrospective, when Mussarat (Liberty, AFB Mgr.) told me I was gonna train with a bunch of other guys under the same roof, she told me I had to be the tip of the spear in order to be acknowledged by the trainers and shine above the rest. Also she said that she considered it was a disadvantage to train on the management college for it was to theorical and not to practical. Well, I can honestly tell that she was right regarding being three steps ahead the rest in order to be the first and the best, and though it was not easy because I had to push myself to the limits and do unusual things and what others didn’t want to do, I managed to achieve it and it paid off greately. However, regarding the fact that I would spent to much time dealing with theories and procedures and stuffs without getting to know and deal with the real business, well, I conclude that, if you don’t handle the knowledge which in this case is our main tool, then you could not be an effective manager at all and less likely to succeed. So it’s all up to each new manager to put into practice and practice it over and over again until he becomes a pro. I am grateful to Gavin for he taught me some valuable lessons. Integrity, transparency and honesty is involved in every aspect of a manager job and he showed it to me with his own example and so I know how to do it, in theory at least, but am so putting it into practice from tomorrow on until it becomes natural.

On the sad note about the time spent there, I will mention an incident I had with a fellow country college. He didn’t agree with the way I handled a situation and he just exploded and verbally abused me in front of other people and while I never cared about being cursed in front of others, it hurt me so bad, cuz we have the same blood running in our veins and we should be more than friends, specially because we are probably the closest family we are gonna have while far away from Pma. So I had to report him to our supervisor and deal with the incident and he got even angrier and bitter and never talked to me again. I tried to talk to him and make peace, but he refused and said, he didn’t want. So it was incredibly unconfortable for me to have him around hating me and telling people what a monster I was. Catalin said to me that his problem might be something else and that he just found that day’s situation to justify his open hate toward me. Not cool….at all. Well, I left it in the hands of God and I forgive him.

Finally, it was tough to leave people behind wondering if I will ever see again, but at least this time, I took plenty of pictures to those persons that meant something to me and that have left a footprint in my life.